The Wise King’s Request

The storyteller

Giles Abbott started storytelling in 1999 in response to a sudden, but not total, loss of sight. Since then he has become an award-winning storyteller, who just happens to be the UK’s only professional blind storyteller. His repertoire includes Iron-Age myths from the British and Norse traditions, Greek myths as well as folk tales from all around the world. He tells them either in their traditional style or with a more modern twist. He has performed at numerous storytelling, literature and other festivals including Wilderness, Festival At The Edge, Beyond The Border, Whitby Folk Week, Westcountry, Sting In The Tale, Oxford Storytelling Festival, East Anglia Storytelling Festival and the Birmingham, Warwick and Oxford Literature Festivals. In January 2020 he called time on a long running residency at the Last Tuesday Society where, for 10 years, he told stories for adults in the magical, macabre and intimate setting of the Viktor Wynd Museum Of Curiosities in Hackney. In 2020 he intends to tell stories on the rooftop of the Queen of Hoxton pub in Shoreditch, where he says there will be tales of characters without hearts, brains or courage.